


Find Your Peace

by Robin Hood (kjack89)



Series: Season 19 Episode Tags [4]
Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Episode Tag, Established Relationship, M/M, Post-Episode: The Undiscovered Country
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-09
Updated: 2018-02-09
Packaged: 2019-03-15 22:45:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13623084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kjack89/pseuds/Robin%20Hood
Summary: Rafael felt the bed dip and creak as Sonny sat up in bed. Once upon a time, Sonny would’ve rolled over in bed and kissed him, whether on the lips, or on his temple, or his forehead. On a good day, Rafael would’ve kissed him back, and their impromptu make out session would inevitably make one or both of them late.But Sonny did not roll over.Just as Sonny had not rolled over for the past two weeks.





	Find Your Peace

**Author's Note:**

> I'm still here. I'm still going. Barisi lives on because of this fandom, and we're not done.
> 
> And that's all I'm gonna say about the topic.
> 
> This fic was an attempt less at a fix-it and more at giving myself some peace and leaving these characters in canon in a place that I can still build from. Even if nothing I write from here on out is remotely canon-adjacent, I still needed this to be able to ground myself and my writing.
> 
> So...sorry for dragging y'all along with me.
> 
> Usual disclaimer, with the added caveat that this is unbeta'd and rushed so there's likely some typos in there. Please be kind and tip your fanfic authors in the form of comments and/or kudos!

Rafael felt the bed dip and creak as Sonny sat up in bed. Once upon a time, Sonny would’ve rolled over in bed and kissed him, whether on the lips, or on his temple, or his forehead. On a good day, Rafael would’ve kissed him back, and their impromptu make out session would inevitably make one or both of them late.

But Sonny did not roll over.

Just as Sonny had not rolled over for the past two weeks.

Just as Sonny hadn’t casually pressed a kiss to the top of his head in the morning while Rafael drank his coffee and read the Times. Just as Sonny hadn’t texted him throughout the day with any variety of inane questions and observations and jokes and whatever else he normally peppered Rafael’s day with.

And considering that Rafael didn’t have anything to occupy him otherwise at the moment, the absence was particularly marked.

“You’re up early,” he said, speaking out into the silence that clouded not just their bedroom but their entire relationship, and he slowly propped himself up to watch Sonny grabbing clothes from the closet.

Sonny shrugged, tugging off the undershirt he had slept in. “I gotta take care of a few things before work,” he said noncommittally. He stepped out of his flannel pajama pants next, and once, Rafael would have made any number of jokes about him pantless and half-naked, but now he just looked away, as if the sight was something that didn’t belong to him anymore. “You got that interview today?”

“Tomorrow,” Rafael corrected.

Rita had gotten him an interview with a firm that specialized in victim advocacy. Well, first Rita had yelled at him for a solid fifteen minutes straight, then made him take her out to dinner — for which he paid, and considering the fact that he was newly unemployed, there was even more indignity involved than usual in that — and _then_ she’d gotten him the interview.

Sonny nodded. “Right, tomorrow,” he said, pulling on his slacks. “That’s good. Hopefully you get the job and get to become a full member of society again.”

The joke fell painfully flat.

Rafael counted to three in his head before forcing himself to keep his voice light as he asked, “So where are you going?”

Sonny didn't look at him, buttoning his shirt with practiced fingers. “You know where I'm going.”

“Church?” Rafael asked, mostly rhetorically, just as his original question had been mostly rhetorical.

Sonny had gone to church every single day since Rafael had been acquitted, and probably before that. Rafael wouldn’t know, because Sonny had gone to stay with his parents during the trial. He didn’t blame Sonny for that, no matter how much it hurt at the time.

No matter how much it still did.

It was no more than he deserved.

“Again?” he asked.

Still rhetorical.

“Yeah,” Sonny said shortly. “Again.”

Rafael sighed and sat up fully, raking a hand through his hair. “We need to talk about this,” he said.

Sonny shrugged. “After Confession.”

“What do you possibly have to confess?” Rafael snapped, irritated in spite himself, in spite knowing that this was all his fault, that the only one he had to blame was himself. “You won't look at me, you won't touch me—”

“It's not me that I'm going for,” Sonny snapped, finally meeting Rafael’s eyes.

Rafael froze. “Has the Church started granting absolution in abstentia?” he asked, the hollow pain curling in his chest again.

Sonny shrugged again, every line in his body tensing into irritation as if he was gearing up for the fight that they weren’t going to have still — yet — because he was just going to go to church and work and when he got home late at night, straight to bed, just as he had every single night for two weeks.

Rafael almost would’ve preferred the fight.

“No,” Sonny said. “They don’t grant absolution in abstentia. But God—” He broke off, and when he spoke again, there was something raw and honest and pained in his voice. “But God knows I’m still gonna try.”

Rafael winced and looked away, tracing his fingers over the duvet cover. They had picked this bedding out together, laughing and thrilled with their new life together, all of six months ago.

It felt like a lifetime.

“Maybe I should go stay with my mom for a bit,” he offered quietly.

Lucia was in a state of deep denial, and Rafael suspected that she’d maintain that for the rest of her life. It was easier for her, and God knows he couldn’t exactly blame her.

Sonny sighed. “No, don’t — don’t do that.”

“Sonny, this isn't working,” Rafael said, his voice low and pained. Sonny just shook his head and Rafael pressed, “I mean, my God, Sonny, you won't touch me, you won't kiss me, you won't even look at me—”

“Because everytime I look at you I don't see the man that I fell in love with!” Sonny burst, and Rafael flinched. “And because I'm trying so hard to hold onto what we had — what we were.”

Rafael felt the now all-too-familiar numbness spread through him, and he stood, not looking at Sonny. “If you have to hold on this tightly, then maybe it is time to let it go.”

He didn’t stay to see how his words landed. Picturing the hurt that would’ve crossed Sonny’s face was torture enough, so he made a hasty escape to the kitchen, to turn the coffeemaker on and try to hold it together just long enough for Sonny to slam the door after him.

But to his surprise, Sonny followed him into the kitchen, his brow furrowed. “You think it’s time to just end this?”

Rafael sighed. “I didn’t say that,” he said, grabbing two mugs from the cabinet. “But the doesn’t change the fact that this isn’t working. We’re stuck in neutral, Sonny, and I’m well aware that I’m the one who stuck us here, but we still can’t keep going like this.” Sonny shook his head slowly, and Rafael sighed again. “I get that you hate me, but—”

“You think that I hate you?” Sonny interrupted, his expression darkening. “I hate what you _did_. And I am so fucking furious at you for what you did that I can barely look at you without wanting to punch something, but I don’t hate you. I never could. And that’s…” He trailed off. “That’s why I keep going to church. Because I have to find a way to make it so that I’m not this mad all the time.”

“You could try talking to me,” Rafael suggested hollowly. “Actually tell me what you’re feeling instead of drifting through our apartment and our life together like you’re not actually even here.

Sonny’s eyes flashed to his before he shook his head and looked away. “You don’t want to hear what I have to say.”

“I do.”

Rafael lifted his chin defiantly as Sonny looked back at him again, something like scorn in his expression. “Really?” Sonny said, and Rafael could hear the simmering fury there, barely contained. “You want to hear how I think you had absolutely no right to do what you did? You want to hear how even after all this time of us talking about how you wanna leave the DA’s office, how you’re burning out, that I cannot believe to my core that the Rafael Barba I know and love would do this, would burn down everything he ever stood for and believed in just to be free?”

“That’s not what this was about,” Rafael countered, and Sonny threw his hands up in frustration.

“And see, this is why I don’t want to do this! This is not an argument, Rafael — this is me saying what I feel and you can’t lawyer your way out of that one.” Sonny paused, then barked a quiet, sad laugh and ran a hand across his face. “Of course, you can’t lawyer your way outta anything anymore.”

That dig stung, and Rafael took a moment before asking, “So then what’s your point, Sonny?”

“My point is that you had other options. You had — Christ, Raf, you had a _world_ of options. That baby was dying on his own and the doctors could’ve ended it or the parents could’ve, but _no_ , it had to be _you_ , for no reason that I’ve yet found compelling.” Sonny’s voice was shaking, and Rafael felt very small, pressed against the counter as Sonny finally got everything he needed to say off of his chest. “And I’ve watched you pull some fucking harebrained shit recently, including involving me in forcing a mistrial, but you really took the cake when you killed a baby.”

Tears were shining in Sonny’s eyes, even if he was more angry than sad, and once Rafael might’ve gone to him, might’ve offered what comfort he could, but he had no comfort to offer now.

Just gasoline to add to the fire that was already burning their relationship down.

"Then call it like you clearly see it, Detective," he snarled, his hackles raised, his own self-loathing rearing its ugly head, ready to put the finishing touches on the destruction that he wrought. "Call me a murderer like you clearly want to."

Sonny stared at him before his shoulders slumped in defeat, a gesture Rafael recognized far too frequently of late. "You're not a murderer," Sonny returned, soft and sad, and it hurt so much worse than the fury had. "Murder has a legal definition and you weren't found guilty of homicide." He met Rafael's eyes. "But you and I both know, an acquittal is not same thing as you being innocent."

Rafael swallowed hard, because he did know that. With every fiber of his being, he knew that. "So then where does this leave us?" he managed finally. "When you can't stand to so much as look at me, where do we go from here?"

"I don't know," Sonny said honestly. Rafael shook his head but Sonny continued, "But I know that I'm not done. I can't...I want to walk away, Raf. I need you to know that every instinct I have is telling me to cut and run. Every instinct but one. And I am—" He broke off, choked up by tears. "I love you too much to walk away, but I guess I don't love you enough to just get over this. Not yet."

"No," Rafael said, softly. Because he understood, even if he never thought he would. "You love me too much to just get over it. Because you love me enough to want me to be a better man than I am."

Sonny bowed his head for a moment before nodding. "Yeah," he said. "Something like that, anyway."

They both stood in silence for a long moment, things left unsaid filling the space between them. Finally, Rafael sighed. “I don’t want to walk away either,” he said. “Not from you at least. But I don’t — I don’t know how to make this work when I’m not the man you fell in love with anymore.”

Sonny sighed, something bone-deep and weary in the sound, and for the first time in two weeks — for the first time in longer than that — he reached out and pulled Rafael to him, holding him tightly. Rafael hid his face against the long line of Sonny’s neck and breathed in deeply and tried not to sob into Sonny’s shirt. “I don’t know either,” Sonny admitted softly, his lips moving against Rafael’s hair. “But I know that I have to try.”

Rafael nodded slowly. “Then I’m willing to try, too.”

“Come to church with me.”

Rafael pulled back slightly to meet Sonny’s eyes, a frown puckering his brow. “Sonny—”

“Please,” Sonny said, and it wasn’t his usual earnest plea when he wanted to Rafael to do something that Rafael didn’t want to. It was quiet. It was desperate. And Rafael knew he would never be able to say no, no matter what the request was. “I need this.”

“Why?” Rafael asked tiredly. He hadn’t gone to Confession in so long that he knew he’d get nothing out of it besides the guilt he’d been trying to dodge his entire adult life.

“Because if God can forgive you, then maybe I can, too.”

The words took Rafael’s breath away, and he nodded slowly and let Sonny pull him back in, holding onto Sonny for a moment longer. “Ok,” he said. “Then I’ll go.”

Sonny pressed a kiss to the top of his head. “I love you,” he said.

Rafael knew.

It was the only thing that had kept him going the past two weeks.

“I love you, too,” he said, his voice muffled against Sonny’s dress shirt.

Sonny kissed the top of his head once more before telling him, “We’re gonna get through this. Somehow. God is probably the only one who knows how right now, but we are. And we’re gonna be ok.”

It was the first time Sonny had said that since all this had started, and Rafael didn’t even bother trying to stop the tears. “Yeah,” he whispered. “Yeah, we are.”

He didn’t deserve Sonny. Never had, and never again would, not after everything.

But he still had him.

And while he might be going to church in search of absolution, there was one other thing he was going to offer whatever God was listening:

His gratitude.


End file.
